SPRINGHILL, N.S. (CP) - You can't make out exactly what she's saying, but it's clear she's mad as hell. A woman locked up on the segregation side of the tiny maximum-security prison is "having a bad day."

Staff surround the closed door, trying to quiet her screams. Inmates giggle down the hall. It's enough to make Suzette Peters cry. The 41-year-old, serving time for robbery at Springhill Institution, has heard the screaming before. But it still breaks her heart.

Peters appears to have it together. She says she's kicked drugs, her bad habits. She's studying to become a counsellor to help others in need.

She gets a lot of practice here, when fellow inmates come to talk. What tugs at her most are the women "who shouldn't be here." The ones with psychiatric problems who are stuck in this cramped satellite of a men's prison.

"It's disturbing to know . . . they're not getting the proper attention they should be getting," says Peters.

Some women throw things, bang doors, slash themselves and are verbally or physically abusive. They get thrown into segregation, where they carry on.

"It's very sad," says Peters.

Mental health problems are much more prevalent among women prisoners than men. Statistics vary. But the majority of women at this institution exhibit some aspect of a personality disorder, officials say.

Corrections says inmates with mental illnesses do get medication and help from staff psychologists and therapists. But the women have to be ready for therapy before they get it.

The department runs the Regional Psychiatric Centre in Saskatoon, Sask., a secure mental-health hospital for offenders. However, it only houses about 200 and the vast majority of patients are men.

Advocates say women should have their own mental-health facility - they should not be in prison at all, and certainly not in segregation.

"We've got women who are really mostly a danger to themselves, but who are emotional," says Kim Pate of the Canadian Association of Elizabeth Fry Societies.

"They will yell some horrible things . . . and end up serving many, many more years than what they were initially sentenced to."

Springhill inmate Tona Mills has more than doubled her original sentence that way.

Mills, who spent most of last year in segregation, has verbally and physically assaulted staff and repeatedly hurt herself.

To quiet her anger, which explodes in spurts, she is sometimes maced. She's been left alone for hours when all she wants is company.

While a few guards will stay and talk when she's feeling low, they're the exception, she says.

"(Staff) don't know what to say or do," she says. "By making it harsh on people - taking everything away from you, not talking to you and trying to help you through the way you're feeling - just makes you feel worse."

In a recent court appearance, a judge said she shouldn't be in prison but somewhere she can be treated.

Staff here recognize that segregation isn't good for women with psychiatric problems but say "the hole" is only used as a last resort.

"Certainly it's not done lightly," says Graeme Dyck, a psychologist at Springhill.

Other staff say they do what they can but the women aren't getting all they need.

"Most of them require a therapeutic environment which we don't have," says parole officer Suzette Lavandier.

At five new prisons built for women in the last six years, inmates with problems get all kinds of help, including therapy through art and horticulture.

Troubled women in maximum-security will have access to better services once they move to those centres as early as this fall, say corrections officials.

But Mills says she needs more help now.

"They hardly do anything with me," she says. "They see me once a week for an hour or whatever, but I'm always in that cell.

"It's their answer, to just lock me up."